A CHARITY concert raising money for the British Legion and Children’s Society will be performed in Burley-in-Wharfedale next week, 100 years on from beginning of the Battle of Gallipoli.

Burley Probus Club is organising a charity concert in St Mary’s Parish Church, Main Street, Burley, on Friday, April 24, featuring the Burley-based Wharfedale Male Voice Choir and international organist Chris Denton, currently the director of music at St Mary’s There will be a First World War theme to the concert.

The lord mayor and the lady mayoress of Bradford, Cllr Mike Gibbons and Elizabeth Sharp, are expected to be in attendance.

April 24 marks the 100th anniversary of the eve of the start of the ill-fated Gallipoli campaign, one of the big disasters of the First World War, with Allied losses in excess of 70,000 men.

On that date, final preparations were underway for troops to be landed on a series of beaches on the Gallipoli peninsula.

The expedition was undertaken to relieve pressure on the Western Front, but was also partly in response to an earlier request from the Russians to launch a diversionary operation against the Turks.

The possession of the Gallipoli peninsula was essential to the control of the Straits of the Dardanelles, and eventual access to the Black Sea.

On April 25, and in the following few days, bloody battles ensued on the beaches, and then on the cliffs and beyond.

The Allied troops did succeed in getting footholds in some areas, but fiercely defended beaches like ‘Z’ ­— later known as the Anzac (Australian and New Zealander Army Corps) Cove ­— saw huge numbers of casualties.

On nearby beach ‘V’, there were many hundreds of British losses on this first day.

Several tens of thousands of Allied troops were eventually landed, and costly trench warfare followed.

It was all to no avail, however ­— the campaign ended in failure and the peninsula was finally evacuated in January 1916.

The concert begins at 7.30pm.

Tickets are now available from Roger Charnley on 01943 864774, Vernon Whelan on 01943 863478, or on the door.